What Is UX and Why Is It Important?

UX stands for User Experience. If you are getting your website designed, you may not have heard of it before, but it is becoming increasingly important when it comes to making your website stand out in a competitive marketplace.

If you are launching a website in the travel niche, UX may be something that you want to seriously consider. Here is an overview of what it entails and why it is so important. You can then decide whether you want to invest in a designer with experience in this area.

UX (user experience) designers

UX designers such as ourselves at CSI Media can be incredibly useful when it comes to making sure your website is working as hard as it can be. You may think that your site provides a good user experience, but until it undergoes testing by a specialist, this remains pure speculation.

A site may look and feel good to use, but it really needs to be tested using specialist tools in order to know for sure that the user experience is a positive one – as well see if there are any glitches.

Usability testing

When your site undergoes testing, experienced consultants will test and analyse the way in which users interact with your site.

To do this, they will use a variety of detailed techniques using specialist tools, and this will provide them with feedback on:

• what your customers really want; and
• how you can improve the experience.

Because at the end of the day, it is not about how beautiful your website is. You may think that it is great to look at and a pleasure to use, but testing is the only way to know for sure.

Improve customer satisfaction

There are some major benefits of undergoing UX testing, such as increasing customer satisfaction because you will be providing exactly what they want from the website experience.

An increase in customer satisfaction can lead onto an increase in customer loyalty.

Give your sales a lift

Increased customer satisfaction and loyalty can also help you to increase sales. After undergoing testing, your website will do more than just look good: it will be functional.

When you provide users with exactly what they want, this can help you to generate conversions. And by providing a pleasant experience, you can encourage more customers to return again in the future - hopefully leading to even more sales.

Plan your development more effectively

Testing can highlight potential problems that you may not have known about before. This means when you redesign or develop your site, you will know what to focus on. If your designers also provide usability testing, they can use it to guide the redesign, and this can help to save costs in the long term.

We believe that getting an independent specialist to test the UX makes sense. After all, if you are involved with the design of your website, you can be so close to the project that you miss things that could make a real difference to usability and the whole experience – a bit like not being able to see the wood for the trees!

Improve the experience for your visitors

In a competitive niche like travel, the user experience of your website could be what sets you apart from your competition. You should be doing everything possible to ensure that the user experience is as good as it can be.